Custom Features, Plugins, Template & Theme Last Updated June 2026 If you see a functionality or feature on one of our other websites on UBS that you’d like to use for your site but you’re not seeing it, let us know and we would be happy to help. Many features are added or enabled automatically, but some require advanced level access or the assistance of the College of Fine Arts Web team. Custom Features Google Analytics for WordPress – Enabled by the COFA Web team on the day your website goes live. To access analytic and visitor data about your site, please send a Gmail address to the COFA Web team. Discover the power of analytics data and start making data based decisions today. Search – The search form is required on all sites. Footer content (such as department logos, contact information and social media icons) Menus – Adding or removing menu items. Social Media AddToAny – you have the ability to enable social media sharing buttons on a page or post By request, the Web Team can add social media icons to the header, footer or sidebar of your website linking to your Facebook, Youtube or other social media accounts. AddToAny Follow – follow buttons for your social media accounts Simple Social Icons – icons linking to your social media accounts. This widget allows us to customize the colors to match your site’s branding color palette. Plugins and Widgets There are optional types of content, called Plugins and Widgets, that can display additional content or provide additional functionality for your site. Some Widgets are available in the Block Editor, but some must be enabled and managed by the Web Team. Contact us to discuss using these features. Unlike non-University of Texas versions of WordPress, the sites.utexas.edu service offers only pre-selected and pre-installed Plugins and Widgets that have been vetted by our campus’s information technology staff to ensure that they are secure, reliable, and accessible to all users. Homepage Feature adds a full width hero image to the homepage only. See demo here. “Teams” allows you to create rows and columns in a responsive grid layout. The typical use of the plugin is for creating a directory of people but it can be used creatively to solve many other layout needs. Tables – The TablePress Plugin allows you to easily build data tables on your WordPress site. Please see the accessibility instructions on this page before publishing your table. RSS – Display content from an RSS feed, usually from a different website. We can use this to embed events from the Department websites. HTML – Add custom HTML. Potential use, includes embedding content from external websites. Ways to Display your News Blog Posts: Archives – A list of links to each month of your blog or news items. Calendar – A clickable calendar to link to your blog and news items. Categories – A clickable list or drop-down menu of the Categories of your news or post pages. Recent Posts – A list of links to the most recent blog or news items on your site. Theme Please do not change the Theme. With a few exceptions, all official university websites should use the UT Austin branded theme. If you are interested in a different theme or have concerns about the theme, please contact us. Templates Several templates are available with different areas where Plugins display or Widgets can be assigned. The template you select will determine the layout of your web page. It’s a bad idea to change the “default” template since this may unexpectedly break some styling and layout throughout the site. If you desire more Template options for different content on your website we will be happy to help. The most common template areas used in the college are the Header Image area and Sidebars. Header Image The image at the top of your WordPress site is called the Header Image. If you want to change, add, or delete your header image email the COFA Web Team as we’re the only ones with the ability to do so. The image can be as tall or short as desired, but must be a width of 960 pixels to retain the best image quality. Sidebars All sites will have a Default Template which usually includes a special content area on the right-hand side of each page called the Sidebar. Most pages, including blog and news posts, will use the Default Template unless another template is selected. It’s a bad idea to change the “default” template since this may unexpectedly break some styling and layout throughout the site. Learn More The university blogs service provides more details on Using Plugins and Widgets.
